20 June 1944
by hotpinkfleur
Summary: A perfect summer night - tea, divorce discussions, and murder in Little Hangleton.


this attacked my brain at five in the morning and wouldn't let go until i finished. :3

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><p>The drawing room became uncomfortably warm under my mother's imperious stare. The servant finished pouring the after-dinner tea and departed, clearly ill at ease in the tense atmosphere. "Well, now, that took overlong. I must remember to discipline her later," said Mother. "Now Tom. Have you considered the - the delicate matter any further? <em>Re<em>considered, perhaps?"

I sighed. "Mother, I told you. Cecilia and I will work it out amongst ourselves. "

"Yes, but Tom dear, I would really like to-"

Loud footsteps pounded down the hall, and the cook burst into the drawing room, waving a soapy spoon. "They've bombed London, m'lady! Germany has bombed-"

"Yes, yes, Constance, but we're having a conversation. Do be a dear and have someone clean that up..." Mother waved her off vaguely, with a derisive glance at the clusters of soap bubbles slowly popping on the rug, before turning back to me. "Now, this... divorce. Do you really think it necessary? I mean to say, of course, that we are an upstanding family in the region, and if society was to hear about your unfortunate marital issues, well..."

"Mother," I said, shifting uncomfortably. "It's really not so important. Times are changing, you know, and divorce isn't as shameful anymore.

"But that simply won't do!" She raised her voice most improperly as my father entered the room. "William, make the lad see reason!"

"Mary, darling, I've told you before, we mustn't continue in the family tradition of overbearing mothers. Tom is thirty-three, after all. He can make his own choices."

"Not when they affect our family's reputation!"

Father crossed the room in short, pained strides - his gout was acting up again - and opened a window to the cooling night. He leaned heavily on the windowsill to take deep breaths of the clear midsummer air, and spoke at length, choosing his words carefully. "Tom, son. Why do you feel you must divorce Cecilia?"

My shirt suddenly weighed heavily on my shoulders, as if it were made of wool; I loosened my tie and rolled my neck, considering my answer. "She... Cecilia has been unfaithful."

"See, Mary?" said Father. "Adultery - much worse than divorce." But my mother looked unconvinced.

"What of your own infidelity?"

All three of us spun to the far entrance to the drawing room: a boy of about sixteen leaning casually against the doorframe, twirling a stick in his long fingers, had made his way into our house.

"Who are you, boy? Who let you in?" barked Father.

"You don't recognise me... Grandfather?" The boy smirked. He did indeed have the classic Riddle face: high, sharp cheekbones, glossy black hair, a thin, straight nose; I could see more of my family, my blood, in him as he strolled closer. I could also see a cold, calculating expression.

"I have no grandson," said Father. "Cease this nonsense at once and leave my house."

"Rejected by one parent, abandoned by another... although I'm sure you remember my mother? Merope, her name was." He smiled wickedly when I flinched at the name. "Yes, Merope Gaunt. You left your precious hussy Cecilia for her, remember? I would offer to get you back together, but alas, she died years ago."

"Nothing came of the sham that girl forced me into!" I said forcefully. "She was a liar and a cheat - I was glad to wash my hands of her."

Something in the boy's face tightened: his brow furrowed in anger, his jaw clenched, his lips were thin with fury. He gripped his stick - or was it a stick? maybe a pointer of some kind, although that was absurd - tightly in his right hand.

"If you're trying to pull off more of the same trickery, boy, you can forget it," growled Father.

"No trickery, fools, but sorcery. Witchcraft. _Magic._"

Father seemed to be dumbstruck by this ridiculous statement. Mother scoffed.

"Prove it," I said.

As if he had been waiting for it, the boy barely took time for an evil grin, dissipating his anger (how mercurial, I thought) before lifting the stick and setting the loveseat aflame with a flick.

Mother gave a dramatic little gasp and sank back into an armchair. Father started toward the boy, only to find the boy's stick aimed right between his eyebrows. "Don't move," the boy breathed. "Don't move, or I swear I'll kill you."

"Put it out!" bellowed Father. "Put it out, I say!"

The boy gave another flick of the stick - no, the _wand_, I realised - and the flames choked off as surely as if they'd been doused with water; the loveseat, however, was pristine. My parents' eyes were unable to look away, but I forced myself to look round at the boy, still holding a menacing arm in my father's direction.

"Who are you?" I demanded. He immediately revised his aim, pointed the wand at me instead.

"Me? Who am I?" He laughed, a hideous, cruel sound. "I am Tom Marvolo Riddle, sole descendent of this worthless Muggle family."

"You really are Merope's child?" I asked, unable to shrug off the massive weight that had landed on my shoulders and in my gut. This madman was my son?

"And yours, although I've no idea what she saw in you. Why any self-respecting wizard should succumb to infatuation with a mere Muggle..."

I held up a hand in a 'stop' gesture. "What is a Muggle and why do you keep calling me one?"

He scoffed. "You Muggles are the scum of the earth, no talents worth mentioning, completely useless in every respect. Not even a drop of magic in you; why even bother with your inane lives?"

"He's mad," whispered Mother. "Completely barking."

"You saw the loveseat, Mary," replied Father. "How else could you explain that?"

"Tricks," said Mother in a wild, high voice, "an illusion, collective hallucination. Like that Mah-ropey girl, it's all in our heads."

"Fucking Muggles," spat the other Tom. "You have no idea of the world that exists just beyond your reach. You are weak, ignorant fools. I could kill you with two words, right now. But I shan't. Not yet."

Mother whimpered audibly, a pitiful noise.

"My world - and it shall soon be mine indeed - is one of magic, of things your pathetic Muggle brains could not begin to comprehend. I could turn you into the worthless worms you are inside. I could cause you such pain, such agony, you'd beg me for death. I could do to you anything I please, and all with a few simple words. I am the most powerful wizard the world has ever seen, and I've not even graduated yet. Not that that shithole of a school has anything left to teach me. No, Lord Voldemort will rise soon enough - that is to say, I will rise - and empty the world of Muggles and Mudbloods alike! AVADA KEDAVRA!"

Green - green light everywhere, and a heavy thud as Father's lifeless body hit the floor - Mother screamed - all the doors slammed shut. "Your servants shan't find your bodies until I am far away," said the other Tom in a low voice. A wave of terror paralysed my body

Mother scrambled off the couch and crawled to Father's body, slapping his cheeks frantically.

"It's no use, you stupid bitch, he's dead." Tom was looking at my mother with an expression of such distaste that I felt shudders down my spine despite the horror that threatened to overtake me.

"You - you monster!" screamed Mother. "How could you - how _dare_ you -" She launched herself at him, perfectly manicured nails aimed for his perfect face -

Another flash of green light, and she fell in a heap at Tom's feet. He kicked her body over onto its back, crouched down to examine her face. "To think I'm related to this filth. Tch."

"You are insane," I said shakily. "You are a complete lunatic, you-you... I can't..."

Tom turned those cold eyes to me now, and I felt the whole world go cold around me. "What will Cecilia think when she hears of your untimely demise? D'you think she'll miss you? Or d'you think she'll go back to her secret lover, move on, forget you existed... like you did to my mother?" His eyes narrowed.

"Go ahead then," I said, in my best imitation of bravado. "Kill your own father. If you even can."

He came closer, put his face right up to mine, so that our noses practically touched. He was a mirror image of myself, not a trace of the inbred harpy that had lured me astray so many years before. His dark eyes were wild with bloodlust, and I could have sworn I saw them flash red in that one instant.

"Avada kedavra."


End file.
